


Any Other Way

by RavenDreamer



Category: Warriors - Erin Hunter
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bittersweet Ending, Eloping, F/M, Grief/Mourning, sad but hopeful
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-09
Updated: 2018-11-09
Packaged: 2019-08-21 01:42:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16567208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavenDreamer/pseuds/RavenDreamer
Summary: They can go anywhere they want now, except for home.Leafpool and Crowfeather left the Clans for good. Here's what happened next.





	Any Other Way

The first day after they leave is the best.

Crowfeather picks their route, a straight line across the broad, flat moor, as far away from the Clans as they can get in the shortest time possible. Leafpool scopes out the territory, looking for prey trails and sheltering bushes and all-important healing herbs. So far she hasn’t found much, the patch of moor they’ve found themselves in windswept and barren, but Crowfeather’s confident that in time they’ll reach better territory, somewhere any cat would be proud to live. To thrive.

As the day progresses, the greenleaf sun grows hot in the cloudless sky, beating down on the open moor. Leafpool suggests they rest, so they settle themselves in the shade below a tall limestone outcrop, watching tiny fishes dart in a small, clear pool next to them without making any attempt to catch them.

“Where do you want to go after this?” he asks her. They sit close together, Crowfeather’s dark grey pelt blending with Leafpool’s tabby, their backs to the cool stone of the outcrop and facing out over the expanse of moor. The pale blue mountains loom ahead of them, the Twolegplace squatting to one side. If Crowfeather squints, he can see the glitter of the ocean, just this side of the horizon.

They can go anywhere they want now, except for home.

Leafpool shrugs. “I don’t know. Somewhere pretty, I guess. Maybe with a river - I still miss the Sunningrocks.”

“Not many rivers up here,” he observes. “But I’m willing to keep searching if you are.”

She smiles. “Actually, the river doesn’t matter too much. If you don’t mind, what I’d really like is to go somewhere with other cats.”

“Why?” he asks, surprised.

“Don’t look so upset,” she says. “I know you like quiet, but I want to be able to use my medicine skills. I know I can’t be a medicine cat anymore, but if I could at least help heal cats… It would make everything less of a waste.”

Seeing her expression droop, he tries to divert her. “That’s a good idea. And anyway, your skills aren’t wasted up here. What if I trip chasing after a rabbit?”

“I can’t imagine you mucking up a catch like that.”

“You didn’t know me when I was a new apprentice,” he says. “Took me a moon before Mudclaw stopped sighing every training session.”

“It can’t’ve been as bad as when Cinderpelt taught me how to fight.”

“You can fight?”

“I said Cinderpelt taught me. I didn’t say I learnt anything.”

He laughs, sending the fishes shooting across the pool in a flash of silver. Leafpool leans her head on Crowfeather’s shoulder. Her amber eyes are drooping with sleepiness - barring a few hours’ snatched sleep, they’ve been on their paws since Leafpool agreed to leave the previous evening. Neither of them felt safe resting while they were still close to the Clan territories.

Crowfeather wonders if he should rouse Leafpool now, keep her moving in case one of their ex-Clanmates has found their trail. Instead, he stays where he is, watching as the late afternoon sun makes a halo out of Leafpool’s soft tabby fur. He still can’t believe how beautiful she is - how amazing it is that she chose him.

He doesn’t think he’s ever been so happy.

-

It’s surprising, how quickly their life together falls into a routine.

They can wake up at any time they like now, but somehow they’re always up at dawn, and hunting soon after. They move their nest every night, still searching somewhere to settle permanently, and spend their days out on the moors, hunting, exploring, talking. Crowfeather’s teaching Leafpool how to chase rabbits; in return she tells him about healing herbs.

“This one’s important, Crowfeather,” she’ll say when she comes across a herb she hasn’t shown him yet. “It does wonders with coughs - we’ll have to remember where this is come leaf-bare.”

Or it’ll be for stomach cramps, or reducing pain. Once they come across a herb called borage, with fuzzy green leaves and star-shaped blue flowers, which Leafpool says is used for help a queen produce milk.

“Will we need to come back for this one?” he asks, and Leafpool smiles and tells him _who knows_.

Both of them are happy - at least, Crowfeather is, and he assumes Leafpool feels the same as he does. Unlimited time together, nearly unlimited freedom - what’s not to like? But then one morning, he wakes to find the sun already risen, and Leafpool next to him, crying.

She’s quiet, the sobs racking her body but making no sound, as if trying not to wake him. He asks her what’s wrong, and she glances up like she forgot he was there, and shakes her head. “It’s nothing, just a bad dream. I’m sorry for worrying you.”

“You’re not worrying me,” he protests, which is nonsense because of course he’s worried, but he has to protest somehow - against the fact that Leafpool’s sad when she should be happy, against his inability to help her. “You can tell me. I don’t care if it seems stupid.”

“Thanks, Crowfeather,” she says. “Could you… Do you want to start hunting without me? I’ll be along in a minute, I just need…”

“Of course.” He smiles, trying to look reassuring, and leaves.

That evening, when the day’s travelling is done and they’re preparing a nest under a leafy hedgerow between Twoleg fields, Leafpool says, “I’m sorry for this morning.”

“You don’t need to be.”

“I had this dream,” she says, “about Squirrelflight. I just can’t believe I’m not going to see her again, you know? I hope she’s okay.”

“She’ll be fine,” Crowfeather says. “If I know Squirrelflight. She has your parents, and Brambleclaw…”

Leafpool’s amber eyes are misty again, her expression wobbling, and he trails off. “Look,” he says. “If you want to go back, we can. We can figure something out - it won’t be like this, but it’ll be okay, as long as you’re happy it’ll be okay. Just say.”

“You don’t understand,” she says. “We can’t go back. I’m expecting kits.”

“You’re what?” Crowfeather asks. His mind is whirling, both at Leafpool’s news and the moment she chose to share it. How long has she known? Why didn’t she tell him? He tries to keep his voice steady: “That doesn’t matter. If it comes to it, we could find another queen to look after them.”

Leafpool shakes her head. “I’m not giving them away.”

“We could still go back when they’re older.”

“I guess…”

He sighs. “Leafpool, I’m sorry if I rushed you into this. I thought-”

“You thought right,” she says, but she won’t quite meet his eyes. “I’m sorry. I want to be with you, Crowfeather, I just didn’t realise I’d miss everyone so much.”

Crowfeather nods, wishing away the trickle of relief he feels when Leafpool says _I want to be with you_. Selfishly, he wants Leafpool as far away from the Clans as possible; if there was anything he didn’t realise, it was how little he’d miss WindClan, how free he’d feel.

“We keep going, then?” he asks.

“We keep going.”

-

In the days that follow, they keep searching for a proper home, more seriously now but with just as little success. The area they’re crossing now is richer in prey but also in Twolegs and other cats, and all the possible places already have cats living there. Nobody wants two more cats - even if one of them’s a healer - muscling in on their food supply. Leafpool’s starting to show, struggling to cover long distances and sometimes not feeling well enough to travel at all, and Crowfeather begins to worry that they won’t find anywhere in time, that the kits will have to be born in the open, in danger.

It’s less than a moon since they left the Clans, but already the afternoon by the fish pond seems like a lifetime away.

One evening as they walk by the side of a small, winding river, the shallow water tinted orange by the sunset, Leafpool cuts off mid sentence, letting out a cry of pain. The kits aren’t supposed to come for another half moon, and Crowfeather is terrified. He helps Leafpool down on the grassy river bank. She gasps something he can’t make out.

“It’s fine,” he says. “It’s going to be fine.”

“Are you alright?” A plump tortoiseshell she-cat comes charging down the slope towards the river. She turns on Crowfeather. “Is she-?”

He shakes his head. “Her kits aren’t due yet. I don’t know-”

“Come on,” the she-cat interrupts. “Let’s get her inside.”

She and Crowfeather half-carry Leafpool to her home, a Twoleg barn built out of old weathered stones and lined on the inside with stacked bales of straw. Leafpool is given the she-cat’s nest, a generous pile of straw next to where the she-cat’s own kits are sleeping peacefully, four tiny bundles of fur amid the straw.

The she-cat introduces herself as Peony. She’s been living in the barn for five seasons now, the first four with her former mate and this last one with her newborn kits, after he left her for some she-cat from the Twolegplace. Crowfeather gives his and Leafpool’s names and the short version of their own story. By this point Leafpool’s pain has eased and she’s able to join in the conversation; she and Peony agree that the kits weren’t coming after all, it was just a false alarm.

The night’s drawing in fast, shadows creeping in from the corners of the barn, and Peony invites the two of them to sleep in the barn. “It’s a while since I had company, it’d be my pleasure.”

They’re glad to accept - despite the unnaturalness of the barn, built by Twolegs and their monsters, it’s warm and dry and comforting. Peony lets Crowfeather hunt for mice in the dark corners of the barn, and the three of them sit and eat together.

“I have an idea of a home for you two,” Peony says at one point.“If you don’t mind the solitude, there’s an old fox den up on the moor you could use. It’s quite close - I could visit once these little ones are old enough.”

“That sounds great,” Leafpool says warmly, and Crowfeather nods in agreement.

“I'll point you that way tomorrow,” Peony says. “But if you don't mind, I'll go to bed now. The kits’ll have me up before dawn.”

Leafpool and Crowfeather stay up a little longer, huddled close together in the darkness. They can just see Peony’s kits where the moonlight shines through a chink in the barn wall.

“That’ll be us, soon,” Leafpool says, pointing at the kits.

Crowfeather hasn’t really thought about the kits in that way, more preoccupied with shelter, food, survival. But now, looking at the four small bundles nestled close to their mother and the swell of Leafpool’s belly, he can almost imagine…

“It's strange, isn't it?” she says. “We've been away for what - a moon? This has happened so fast.”

He nods. “Fast, but not all bad, right?”

“Not bad at all.”

“When the kits are old enough,” he promises, “I’ll find you all a forest to live in. They deserve to grow up like ThunderClan kits.”

“What if they end up like WindClan kits?” she asks. “We’ll have to find a forest next to a moor, just to be sure.”

“Maybe,” he says drowsily. “We’ll figure something out.”

-

When the kits finally are born, half a moon after they move out to the fox den, it comes as a shock. One minute they’re out on the moors, enjoying one last walk together before they have the kits to look after. Then without warning Leafpool’s doubled over, crying out, and everything happens at once. There’s pain - Leafpool’s. Panic - Crowfeather’s. Leafpool can’t make it back to the old fox den in time, so they shelter under the sparse, thorny branches of a nearby gorse bush.

There’s a long wait, during which they barely talk. Despite all Leafpool’s medicine training, meticulously taught to Crowfeather, neither of them really knows what’s happening, if something goes wrong.

There’s blood, dark in the dusk light, spilling out onto the moor grass. Crowfeather doesn’t know how much is too much, but - he think this is. Leafpool’s so weak once the kits are finally born, limp on the bloodstained grass, her voice barely rising above a whisper.

“I’m sorry,” he says, just like the day he caught her crying. “Sorry for bringing you out here. That - that this happened.”

Her expression is just as serious as that day, just as fierce. “Crowfeather. You didn't bring me anywhere, you didn't cause this. I love you, and our kits, and this is the decision we made. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Her eyes flutter closed, and Crowfeather’s heart stops. For a few airless moments, he stares at her still body, and then - thank StarClan, thank everything - he sees her chest rise and fall. She’s breathing. Asleep, that’s all.

He sits sentry over her and the kits all night, the only sound the mewing of the kits as they curl close to their mother, suckling her for milk. Leafpool insisted on choosing names for the kits immediately after they were born - not Clan names, because these kits would never become apprentices or warriors or medicine cats, but names that could easily become Clan. Holly and Lion and Jay. Unlike their mother, they’re strong and healthy-looking. He can’t stop looking at them.

Just after dawn, Leafpool wakes, too weak to do much more than feed the kits and talk quietly to Crowfeather. She talks about ThunderClan, about Squirrelflight and her parents and Cinderpelt. About Crowfeather, and the life they’d planned together. About the kits, and her hopes, and her regrets.

Her voice grows quieter and quieter, until it fades out altogether.

And then it’s over.

-

The next day is the worst.

Crowfeather sits there with Leafpool for a long time, until the kits’ cries spur him into action. Right - the kits. They need looking after. They need a she-cat to look after them. He needs to find a she-cat to look after them.

He hates what he’s about to do, hates the idea of imposing on anyone, but the kits are already hungry, and he needs to act. He remembers the way to Peony’s barn without much trouble, carries the kits there with only a little more. When Peony sees him at the entrance, Holly and Lion balanced on his back and Jay clutched in his jaws, his fur ungroomed and expression fallen, her face contracts with sympathy.

“Is she-?”

“She’s-” He can’t manage to say it. “Leafpool’s-”

“I’ll feed them,” Peony says, her eyes darting to the kits he’s carrying. “Mine are almost on solids now. I have more than enough milk if you hunt for me.”

“Thank you,” he says, tears welling for the thousandth time since dawn. Crowfeather never used to cry, but today he can’t stop. “You don’t have to, but - that would be so good of you.”

It’s awkward, at first. They’re a tom and a she-cat sharing a home, sharing kits, but they’re the furthest from what that would imply. Peony misses her mate, vanished to the Twolegplace, and Crowfeather misses Leafpool, misses her like a hole in him, like the world caved in and no-one but him notices. He spends most of his time hunting out on the moors, even though there’s more than enough mice in the barn. Hunting on the moor feels like hunting with Leafpool - if he closes her eyes, it’s like she’s next to him, pointing out the herbs as they go, putting his lessons to use in sprinting after a rabbit.

He collects borage for Peony, every sight of the blue, star-shaped flowers like a claw driven into his flesh as he remembers the sun-drenched afternoon when Leafpool showed him the herb for the first time.

He visits the abandoned fox den that Peony showed them and that he and Leafpool lived in for the last half moon, spraying scent marks at its entrance so no other animal will claim it. Often, far too often, he’ll go on to the gorse bush where the kits were born and where he buried Leafpool, and sit there, sometimes for hours, sometimes until the leaf-fall night draws in around him and the sky is scattered with bright stars. He wonders if Leafpool’s one of those stars, or if she’s in the earth beneath him, or if it even matters.

Meanwhile, the kits grow, and thrive. They realise Jay is blind early on, but he soon gets to know the confines of the barn as well as his littermates, leading the trio into just as many scrapes as the other two. Peony’s four usually keep them in check, but one afternoon Crowfeather returns from hunting to find all seven kits perched on top of the highest straw bale, which wobbles precariously under their weight. Peony pounces on Crowfeather, leading him to the scene before he even has the chance to put his prey down.

“They've been racing each other up those bales all day. Maybe you can persuade them to come down.”

“Me?” Crowfeather looks dubiously up at the group of kits. None of them seem like they want to return to safety any time soon, and he doesn't relish the idea of climbing up after them. “Are you sure? You're the one who's good with them.”

“It's about time you tried with them,” Peony says.

She's not usually so blunt; maybe raising seven kits is beginning to get to her. Crowfeather feels a stab of guilt. “Fine, I'll give it a go.”

It takes a while, but a combination of Crowfeather, Peony and the kits’ growing hunger finally brings them down to earth. Although he joins Peony in scolding them, Crowfeather can't deny his pride that his moon-old kits, even Jay, can manage the climb.

Even without Leafpool, life is going on.

“See,” Peony says. They're looking at the kits, crashed out in a heap in the corner of the barn. “You're not bad with them at all. You just have to try.”

-

Another moon passes. Leafbare is fast drawing in, cold and snow surrounding the barn. Holly, Lion and Jay are old enough to eat solid food now, but Peony insists that Crowfeather stay. He suspects she's glad to have company during the long leafbare nights - he certainly is, even if neither of them has the companion they want most.

Crowfeather teaches the kits to catch mice, first Peony’s then his own. He tells them stories about the Clans, although he always steers clear of explaining exactly how and why him and Leafpool left. He tells Lion and Jay and Holly that their mother was clever and beautiful and loved them very much, but not what happened to her. There's time enough for them to know that.

Newleaf, and Crowfeather finally says goodbye to Peony and moves his family to the old fox den on the moor. He doesn't want to impose for any longer - besides, Peony’s getting close to another tom, a loner who recently moved to the area, and Crowfeather doesn't want to get in the way.

“I'll miss you,” Peony says.

“Me too,” Crowfeather says, surprising himself. “Thanks for everything.”

“We can visit, right?” Holly asks. To nobody's surprise, she's emerged as the leader of the kits - the other six are hanging back in a group, waiting to hear his answer.

“Of course.”

The visits last regularly until the end of greenleaf, when Peony’s kits are old enough to move out and Peony and her new mate leave to be closer to his parents. Crowfeather's happy for her, happy for all of them. He wishes she wasn't gone, though. It's a year since Leafpool died, and as greenleaf fades into leaf-fall he finds himself visiting the grave beneath the gorse bush more and more often. Those days, he feels like he's spiralling, deeper and deeper into grief and regret until the real, present world doesn't feel important anymore.

Holly calls these his ‘black days’, and Jay, his mother's son, wonders if there's a herb that will help. The kits - kits is the wrong word for them now, if they were Clan cats they'd almost be warriors - the young cats help him a lot, but he misses Peony. He misses Leafpool.

Leafpool never came back to the fox den with him and the kits. Leafpool never got to work as a healer, or find a river or a forest to live near, or any of the other plans they made.

Life goes on, but Leafpool's hasn't.

Jay, Lion and Holly help Crowfeather reinforce the fox den so it's warm and watertight enough to face the leafbare ahead. In between fetching and carrying, Crowfeather tells them the old stories about the Clans - the Golden Age of TigerClan and LionClan, the exploits of the earliest warriors and medicine cats, Firestar’s legendary defeat of Tigerstar.

“Firestar was our grandfather, wasn’t he?” Jay asks.

Taken aback - he can’t remember ever sharing this with the kits - Crowfeather agrees: “Yes, he was Leafpool’s father. How did you…?”

Jay shrugs. As if summoned by their mother’s name, Holly and Lion come bounding around to the front of the den, bundles of moss and twigs clutched in their mouths.

“What were you saying about Leafpool?” Lion asks.

“Nothing.”

Later, they share a rabbit that Holly caught on the moor, sitting together at the entrance of the fox den in the last of the evening light. The horizon glows gold with the departing sunset, the stars like white sand sprinkled across the dark blue sky. One year ago, Crowfeather was staring up at those same stars, wondering desperately if Leafpool was up there with them. Now, he looks at Holly, Jay and Lion, his little family down here on the moor, and feels - not at peace, quite, but almost.

 _I wouldn't have it any other way_ , she told him. Maybe, some days, he understands.

“Sorry for snapping earlier,” he says at a lull in the conversation. “That was uncalled for. You deserve to know about your mother.”

As soon as they’re sure that he means what he’s saying, they deluge him with questions. How did you meet? What was she like? Why did you leave the Clans? All the questions that he’s never answered before, and that none of them are sure he’ll ever be willing to answer again.

He tells them everything. He wouldn’t have it any other way.


End file.
